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Sticker of Cream-spot tiger
Bug card No. 1229 of 4,939

Cream-spot tiger

Arctia villica
Eats: PlantsMothsGardens and meadows6 legs

The cream-spot tiger is a striking moth with black front wings covered in big cream patches. When it opens them, it shows bright red or orange back wings with black spots. Its body is black at the front and reddish orange behind.

Lives in
Europe, North Africa and western Asia, in woods, hedges and sunny grassy places
Wingspan
4.5 to 6 cm (1.8 to 2.4 in)
Top speed
about 17 km/h (11 mph)
Flying, estimate
What does it eat?
Its hairy caterpillars eat low plants like dandelions, plantains, nettles, yarrow, blackberries and strawberries.
For real!Photo of Cream-spot tiger
Picture by Danny Chapman. CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How wide are its wings?

Cream-spot tiger wings about 6 cm tip to tip (2.4 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)A banana about 18 cm (7.1 in)
wings as wide as 2 toy building brickscould fly across a whole football pitch in 22 seconds

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cool stuff

Fun facts

1

Its bright colours are scarlet when it is new and fade to orange as it gets older.

2

Its caterpillars are black with tufts of light brown hair and a reddish head and legs.

3

The moths mostly fly at night and come to lights, but the females also fly in the daytime.

4

The caterpillars sleep through the winter and wake up in spring to eat before they turn into moths.

5

In 1992 it was pictured on a German postage stamp.

you asked

Most asked questions about Cream-spot tiger

?What does the cream-spot tiger caterpillar eat?

Many low plants, such as dandelions, nettles, plantains and strawberries.

?How big is the cream-spot tiger?

Its wings measure about 4.5 to 6 centimetres from tip to tip.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Arctia villica
Named by
Linnaeus, 1758
Group
Moths
Family
Erebidae
Classification
Insecta > Lepidoptera > Erebidae
Lives on
Europe, Africa, Asia

Where the facts come from

  1. Arctia villica (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by Danny Chapman. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.

If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.

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